Kurt Russell's Lee Shaw Gives Monarch, And The Monsterverse, The One Thing The Movies Were Missing
This post contains spoilers for "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" episode 4, "Parallels and Interiors."
The Monsterverse is coming up on a decade now, dating back to director Gareth Edwards' "Godzilla" in 2014. But in all of those years, the human characters in the franchise have often left much to be desired. Fortunately, the Monsterverse has finally figured out this piece of the puzzle. The key? Kurt Russell. "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" is currently in the midst of its first season on Apple TV+ and Russell's character Lee Shaw is easily the best human character we've had against the backdrop of this world of monsters.
In nine years of the Monsterverse, we've had some extremely memorable monster action, including one heck of a showdown between Godzilla and King Kong in 2021's aptly named "Godzilla vs. Kong." The humans? That's a different story. Oftentimes, these characters feel like vehicles that are just driving us toward the next monster showdown. Heck, Bryan Cranston's Joe Brody, who was very compelling, was killed off at the end of the first act of "Godzilla," rather frustratingly. That's the way it's been. Lee Shaw has changed that.
It certainly doesn't hurt that the creatives behind this big-budget series managed to attract Russell — one of the most charismatic and likable actors on the planet — to the role. But even outside of that, from a writing standpoint, they've done a lot to make this character compelling, all while tying him into the larger universe. The show's cold open even features John Goodman reprising his role as Bill Randa from "Kong: Skull Island," immediately connecting the events of that movie to Russell's Shaw. Also, not for nothing, Shaw traces his roots back to a 2014 Monsterverse comic. So he didn't come from nowhere.
The past and present collide
Lee Shaw is a military man whose story is only truly starting to come into focus. Part of what works is that we only know so much about him. "Monarch" is set up as a mystery box show and Shaw himself is one of the many mysteries the series sets out to unravel for us. The fourth episode, "Parallels and Interiors," most significantly pulls back the curtain on Russell's version of the character. He might be something like 90 years old (in the show), but he's still whipsmart, crafty, and very likable. You want to know more about him, and that's the key.
But the brilliance of the character as he exists can't be attributed strictly to Kurt Russell. The show's biggest weapon is the fact that his son and fellow actor, Wyatt Russell, is also playing a version of Lee Shaw decades prior when Monarch was first formed. The versions of Shaw from the past and present are interwoven and, the further along the show gets, the better the vision of this man comes into focus. When we're with Kurt Russell, we're taking what we've learned from Shaw in the past through Wyatt Russell and wondering how he got to this place. It's a bit of stunt casting that has some real, meaningful purpose.
For as much credit as Wyatt Russell is owed, the fourth episode of the series gives us that vintage Kurt Russell goodness that drives home the "I like this character" feeling. It's Russell going on a cinematic ride and being a hero. It's the man we know and love from his collaborations with John Carpenter like "Big Trouble in Little China" or "Escape From New York." The charming Mr. Nobody from the "Fast & Furious" movies is on the surface when it needs to be, but there's a far more present, pained, and hardened figure there, not totally unlike John Ruth from "The Hateful Eight." It's Kurt Russell's greatest hits in a monster-filled universe.
The human hero we needed
In fairness to the Monsterverse as it exists, movies are different beasts than TV (at least when a season of TV isn't treated as a 6 or 8-hour movie, as it so often is). "Monarch" isn't being treated as such. Instead, they've invested in offering a different, human perspective on a world reckoning with the existence of monsters. In my interview with the creators of the show, writer/producer Matt Fraction explained that was all very intentional.
"We didn't want it to be the bad version of those movies. We wanted it to be the good version — as good of a version as we could manage — of a show set in this world. That begins with human characters, and the idea that we could start our Godzilla show in a world where everyone knows Godzilla is real. Now what? That's an incredible starting point to tell stories."
Here's what it boils down to: I don't really care to know much of anything more about, say, Sam Coleman (Thomas Middleditch) from "Godzilla: King of the Monsters." I could not, offhand, tell you the name of the character that Millie Bobby Brown plays in this universe. All due respect to her as an actress, the movies she's been in have not been great character pieces. But I definitely want to know more about Lee Shaw, and I want to see more of Kurt Russell (and Wyatt Russell, for that matter) in this universe.
"Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" is streaming now on Apple TV+.